


Ring in the True

by RecessiveJean



Category: Fire and Hemlock - Diana Wynne Jones
Genre: Gen, Magic, Musicians
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-24
Updated: 2014-12-24
Packaged: 2018-03-03 07:56:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,200
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2843777
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RecessiveJean/pseuds/RecessiveJean
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>As the Dumas Quartet prepare for a performance they must once again contend with Tom's enemies, this time in the form of his cello.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Ring in the True

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Pluviann](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Pluviann/gifts).



> Set midbook during their tour.

Sam booked the hall for the last week of December, but he forgot to check the balconies first. Sam was willing to take ownership of that mistake so the other three didn’t rag on him too much, but it was still inconvenient having to slog up and count doorways after the fact.

“Six!” said Ann. “I call that extravagance.”

“Never mind slanging the architect,” Tom decided. “Have we got enough to cover them all?”

They dug into a bag of oak mistletoe and produced five sprigs, looking rather the worse for wear.

“Well that’s hard luck,” Ed muttered.

“Look, I’m awfully sorry,” Sam began, but the others told him to forget it.

“We’ll hang what we have, and just . . . keep an eye on the other door,” Ann decided. “And look, who’s to say anything will even happen tonight?”

But it was an empty speculation, because it had been three weeks since anything did, and they noticed very early on that they could never go more than a month at a time without something happening.

First it had been the stage lights that birthed tiny, stinging pixies and left them with little burn-marks all over their forearms. Then it had been a stack of programs that folded themselves into vicious birds that pecked them all over with paper beaks, some kind of foul-smelling steam creature that escaped the pipes, a woolly lion formed from the moth-eaten aisle runners and a set of curtains that tried to wrap them up and smother them.

“I’d admire the creativity,” Ed had said, “if it wasn’t all at our expense.”

“You’re a generous soul, Ed,” Tom gave him a hearty clap on the shoulder. “And a lion tamer besides.”

“Oh! Well,” Ed said sheepishly, and buffed his fingernails on the lapel of his coat. “It was fairly obvious the poor creature hadn’t any eyes. Not such a risk, getting close after that.”

But it was never the same thing twice. That was the difficulty. They had managed escapes from everything so far, but as they hung five sprigs of mistletoe over five balcony doorways, there was a kind of cautious solemnity shared between them. Because, in the end, _what if_?

“Well, that should do it,” Sam decided, stepped back to admire his mistletoe sprig. “I mean, as much as can be helped.”

“That’s the spirit!” said Tom. “Come on, then.”

The next few minutes were taken up with more ordinary kinds of set-up and preparation. The quartet were kept busy with tuning, plucking, scowling and all the other things that look very impressive and confusing to people who don’t know anything about music.

“Damn,” said Ann, “there goes the peg again.”

“My A string keeps going slack,” Ed muttered.

“Odd,” said Sam, “so’s mine.”

“Is anyone else—” began Tom, then stopped.

They woke to it at almost the same moment. The slipping pegs, the slacking strings . . . it was all too much, too quickly, to be coincidence. As one they laid their instruments down and backed up.

The pegs of Ann’s viola squeaked and squirmed their way free. The violin strings slacked, shimmied and uncurled. Tom’s cello stood on its endpin and began to spin in a menacing, mesmerising circle. As they stared, it picked up speed, whirling faster and faster.

“Is that—” began Sam, but ran out of words to finish the question, so he just left it at that.

“It looks almost like it’s moving forward,” said Ann.

“It _is_!” shouted Tom. “Look out!”

They broke rank and ran.

As the cello whirled in pursuit, all four made for the central exit. They rattled desperately at the handle, only to find the door was stuck fast.

“Haven’t hung anything over this one yet,” Ann said grimly. “Might be the enchantment can work on it, and keep us locked in until . . . well. I’m not sure. But it’s probably not coming after us to discuss the coda.”

“Balcony it is, then,” said Sam, and they scrambled for the stairs, the spinning cello following close behind.

“I call it cruel,” Ed panted, as they took the stairs two at a time, “setting a person’s own cello on him. Takes a really low-minded type of person to think of that.”

“Yes, well,” said Tom, as they reached the top and took a desperate moment to gulp for breath, “now you see the type of family I married into.”

“Here, this one opens.” Ann had not wasted time stopping to catch her breath. She’d gone directly to the nearest of the mistletoe-garnished doors, which was one of only two on that wall that had got a sprig. It yielded easily under her touch.

“Yes, but hang on, what if the cello comes too?” Ed wondered.

“It’s a cello, Ed. It hasn’t exactly got hands to work the handle,” Sam pointed out.

“Yes but it hasn’t got legs either, and that hasn’t stopped it chasing us. It—whoop, look out!”

For the cello had reached the balcony, and whirred menacingly down the aisle toward Ed and Sam. Tom shot a doubtful look past the cello to where Ann stood, holding the door.

“Hadn’t we better be sure?” he wondered. “That it can’t follow us, I mean.”

“Well, make a suggestion!” Ann called back, as Ed and Sam dove in opposite directions. The cello spun through the spot where they had stood.

“Get it to follow you through the one door,” Tom urged. The cello was lumbering around, whirring and whizzing with increasing speed.

“Will it follow just one of us, though?” Ed wondered, peeling himself from the floor.

“It will follow me,” promised Tom, and proved his point by vaulting over three rows of theatre seats to reach the door.

The cello at once did an about-face and spun after him at a great clip. Ann sucked in her breath, but held the door at Tom’s instruction, while Ed crept up on the cello from behind.

Tom tumbled through the door a few moments before the cello did. Ann followed, the cello whirling close behind.

The moment the cello was through the door Ed banged the door shut behind, and ripped the mistletoe from the frame. At almost the same moment Tom and Ann burst back onto the balcony via the second door.

“Close it, close it!” Tom yelled, which Sam did, and ripped the mistletoe off as well.

A hollow clatter sounded against the other side of the door, and then, nothing.

The quartet stood around a moment, panting, before Ann said “well, hadn’t we better check?”

Mistletoe in hand, they advanced on the door, eased it open, and peered into the corridor beyond.

The cello was a cello again, and nothing more.

***

The late-December performance of the Dumas Quartet was met with glowing reviews. Their execution of the program was magnificent: energetic and inspiring.

If the musicians looked a little shell-shocked, and if the cellist seemed to be playing a rather scuffed-up instrument, it at least did not affect the quality of their performance in the least. And most charmingly, all four seemed to have affixed sprigs of mistletoe to the peg boxes of their instruments.

A festive touch, everyone agreed, and very in keeping with the season.

**Author's Note:**

> If you know much of anything about music, it's probably pretty obvious that I don't know much about it at all! I loved your prompt, though, and I couldn't resist a treat. I hope you enjoyed. Happy Yuletide!


End file.
